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WORTHINGTON — District 518 needs a bus driveway for the Intermediate School before the 2022-23 school year begins in August, the Operations Committee of the District 518 Board of Education heard Tuesday from Superintendent John Landgaard.
The Nobles County Board of Commissioners had sent a project out to bid that included the bus access for the Intermediate School as well as safety fixes for the Oxford Street-Crailsheim Road intersection, but only one bid was received.
Because it was much higher than the project estimate, commissioners rejected the bid, and County Engineer Aaron Holmbeck said he’d come up with alternatives such as having county employees do some of the work.
The county board was set to discuss the matter at a 4:30 p.m. meeting Tuesday, hours after the Operations Committee met.
“I’ve made it clear, at least to the (county) engineer, that we have to have that bus access by no later than the last week of August,” said Landgaard, who said he would be at the county board meeting representing the school district.
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School board member Steve Schnieder will also attend the meeting, in his role as City Engineer/Public Works Director for Worthington, he said.
The Operations Committee also received more information about the pond project the Okabena-Ocheda Watershed District hopes to build on the school’s property near the Intermediate School.
The watershed hopes to stop 300 pounds of phosphorus and a significantly larger amount of sediment from reaching Lake Okabena by building a pond on District 518’s property on Crailsheim Road.
The school board indicated they were interested in the project but wanted to reduce the area of the pond, so the watershed had an engineer investigate whether a smaller pond would still be effective.
The results of the engineer’s report were favorable, and school and watershed representatives will meet again to discuss the project and finalize some decisions in the future, the Operations Committee learned.
The committee also discussed whether the school should start building either a baseball field or a soccer field, as a sponsor wanted to donate some money to the school district. Initially, the donor wanted to purchase a scoreboard, but no scoreboards are currently needed, Landgaard said.
District 518’s long-term plans already included building a baseball field and more soccer fields in the future.
No final decisions were made on the matter, which will likely be discussed by the full board during its meeting at 5:15 p.m. June 21.
